






% 














fn. 



LETTER 

TO A LADY IN FRANCE, 

IN ANSWER TO ENQUIRIES CONCERNING 

THE LATE IMPUTATIONS OF DISHONOR 



UPON THE 



UNITED STATES. 



LETTER '^i 



Q r U 



A LADY IN FRANCE 

ON 

THE SUPPOSED FAILURE OF A NATIONAL BANK, 

THE SUPPOSED 

DELINQUENCY OF THE NATIONAL GOVERNMENT, 
THE DEBTS OF THE SEVERAL STATES, 

AND 

REPUDIATION; 

WITH ANSWERS TO ENaUIRIES CONCERNING THE BOOKS 

OF 

CAPT. MARRYAT AND MR. DICKENS. 

BY THOMAS G. GARY. ^ p>' '^ ' 

BOSTON: 

BENJAMIN H. GREENE. 

1844. 






/ 






Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1843, 

BV BENJAMIN H. GREENE, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of tlie District of Massachusetts. 



Andrews, Prentiss ^ Studley, Printers, 
4 Devonshire Street. 



INTRODUCTION. 



An American lady, who went to Europe while very young, and 
when all was tranquil and flourishing in the United States, lately 
wrote to a lady here, to enquire what ground there could possibly 
be for the dreadful accusations which she hears against us every- 
where abroad. The following letter was written, at the request of 
her correspondent, in answer to the enquiry. In order that any 
future allusion to it might be understood, it was shown to some of 
her old friends here, who had ridiculed the idea of any attempt at 
exculpation, supposing that the nation was dishonored, past hope. 
They were not only surprised at what could be said to the con- 
trary, but so much relieved by a simple statement of the facts, that 
they urged the printing of the letter, here, as well as sending it to 
France. 

Perhaps those who are thoroughly informed on public affairs, 
may smile at their simplicity in both respects. But there seem to 
be many people, ladies in particular, and young persons, who 
know little on the subject but what they gather from detached re- 
marks ; who are puzzled by the confusion of national institutions 
with those of the separate states, in the use of names ; and who, 
having no ready means of examining the subject, avoid it, as one 
that will not bear investigation. 



IV 



To all such, a clear statement, in familiar language, which is 
attempted in the following letter, may give the pleasure that fairly 
belongs to those who shrink from every thought of dishonor ; and 
may renew their confidence in our system of self-government. 

For the convenience of the reader, the principal subjects of re- 
mark are noted under separate heads, as they occur ; but, as the 
letter was written without them, the divisions are not, in every 
case, exact. 



SUBJECTS OF REMARK. 



Page 

Bank of the United States, 8 

Pdblic Debts, 15 

National Debts, 18 

Debts of the Separate States, 19 

Books of Travellers, .....---27 

Love of Money, 29 

Gravity of Manners, 29 

Slavery, .....------31 

Lynch Law, &c., 34 

Success of our Form of Government, 37 

Selfishness, &c., 39 

Dishonesty, 40 

Coarseness of Manners, 41 

Tyranny of Public Opinion, 42 

Security of Property, 45 

Elections, their Frequency, «&c., 46 

Popular Violence, Mobs, &c. 48 

Strength of the Government, 52 

General Results of our Experiment, 54 

Grovping Attachment to the Union, 56 

Note, 59 



LETTER 

TO 

MISS H , 



FRANCE 



/ 
BOSTON, Oct. 31, 1843. 

My Dear E : 

I occasionally see your letters, always with 
interest, but more so of late, because some of your 
enquiries show that you feel concerned on a subject 
that warmly engages my own feelings, — the reputa- 
tion and the true character of the United States. The 
expressions which show that your regard for the land 
of your nativity has endured an absence of so many 
years with new associations, prompt me to offer you 
an explanation of some of the changes that appear to 
have come over us. It is a formidable undertaking to 
address a young lady on national matters ; but, if you 
have the patience to read, I may venture to promise 
you some relief from the humiliation which an Ameri- 
can in Europe is now compelled to endure. If I 
cannot furnish the means of repelling, at once, the 
odium that we suffer, you will, at least, have the satis- 



8 



faction of perceiving that it is not entirely deserved ; 
for I think I can convince you that it has not arisen 
from any intention to defraud, on the part of our 
people. 

UNITED STATES BANK. 

You will want to know something of that great 
bank which failed, called " The Bank of the United 
States." It is a matter of deep concern in Europe, 
for a large portion of its stock was owned there. 1 
must remind you that our national government is 
formed by a combination among the people of differ- 
ent independent states, each of which manages its 
own domestic concerns, while all of them choose to be 
represented together, as one, in their intercourse with 
tlie rest of the world. The powers necessary for this 
latter purpose were given to that government, and it 
was the intention of the several states that it should 
have no more. One of the first questions which arose 
in its administration was, whether the power to estab- 
lish a bank had been given. It was not expressed ; 
but Washington thought it a necessary incident, and 
a bank was established for a limited time, in opposi- 
tion to the opinions of a numerous class of politicians. 
When the limited time expired, this class of men had 
prevailed. A renewal of the bank was refused. Its 
affairs were brought to a close ; and every stockholder 
received back his share of the capital, in full. 

After some years, it was concluded, that, on the 
whole, the bank had been useful. Some men changed 
their opinions ; and a new bank was created, also for 



a limited term. When that term drew near its close, 
President Jackson, who was in power, declared him- 
self opposed to a renewal ; and, finally, refused his 
consent, without which it could not be obtained. The 
bank, therefore, prepared to bring its affairs to a 
close, as was done in the former case. I was at that 
time a director in one of its branches, and I speak 
from personal observation. My position did not ena- 
ble me to get complete information ; but I believe 
that the bank was then sound ; and that if the stock- 
holders had chosen to receive back their capital, as 
they were at liberty to do, each one would have had 
his share of it entire. It is true, that, in the earnest 
discussions that preceded, an unexpected prominence 
was given to Mr. Biddle, the president of the bank ; 
and he may have used some part of its funds injudi- 
ciously or improperly, to increase its strength, in a 
contest somewhat of a political character. But I think 
there is sufficient proof, that if there were any defi- 
ciency then, it must have been a very small one ; and 
that, in the final division, if the stockholders had 
chosen to have it, they would have found that the 
investment had, on the whole, been a good one for 
them. 

When the term expired, my duty, and that of my 
fellow directors, ceased. The portion of the capital 
used in our branch was returned entire, after yielding 
large profits ; and we have had no connection with 
the affairs of the institution since. There then ceased 
to be a national bank ; and, from that time to this, we 
have had no such bank in this country. 

But Mr. Biddle was determined not to lose the irn- 
2 



10 



portance which his position had given him. If he 
could not be the head of a national bank, he thought 
a substitute might be found in a bank of his own state. 
He, therefore, represented to the legislature of the 
State of Pennsylvania, that here was a large capital, 
belonging in a great measure to foreigners ; that to 
send it back to Europe would check our prosperity, 
particularly that of their own state ; but that, if they 
would grant the necessary privileges for a new bank, 
he should probably be authorized to pay them several 
millions of dollars as a bonus, to aid their public insti- 
tutions and works, in return. That state agreed to 
do so. He then represented to the stockholders of 
the national bank, who were preparing to receive 
back their money, what I think he believed, that, al- 
though he had now no connection with the govern- 
ment, he could use their capital as profitably as before. 
He desired them, in a circular letter, to decide whether 
they would take shares in the new bank, and to au- 
thorize some one to act for each of them. They 
generally decided that they would do so ; and almost 
all of them gave their power of acting to him, a cir- 
cumstance that proved particularly unfortunate in the 
end. Such as preferred to have their money, obtained 
it readily, and more, by selling their shares to others. 
He seemed now to be completely successful. He 
had been led to think that he divided the favors of the 
nation with its President, General Jackson, in a grand 
warfare ; and he thought himself the conqueror. He 
was intoxicated with a supposed omnipotence in bank- 
ing. Perhaps, as some people believe, he hoped to 
make himself President of the United States. If he 



11 



was too wise to indulge in such a dream, I know that 
some of his friends were foohsh enough to think of 
that elevation for him. 

The new institution received the name of the " Bank 
of the United States," as if it had been a renewal of 
that which had just been closed. Now, as you know, 
the United States are considered as belonging to "the 
people " ; and all the world adopt the name, if they 
like. Every city, where there are ships, has a "United 
States " insurance office. If an unusually large tavern 
is built, it is called the " United States " hotel ; and if 
you step into an omnibus, it is very likely that you find 
it is called the " United States." Really, the United 
States, as a nation, had no more to do with this bank, 
than they have to do with an omnibus coach. This 
fact was well understood at the time, or ought to have 
been, by the stockholders ; but was probably soon 
forgotten. The bank is now supposed by great num- 
bers in Europe, I believe, to have been a national 
establishment ; and is spoken of as such by some who 
know that it was not, but wish it to be believed so, 
that they may strengthen the case against us as a 
nation. 

You will ask, perhaps, why some of our own people 
did not come forward to explain all this ? A large 
part of the nation were loud in doing so. All those 
opposed to any national bank were forward in de- 
nouncing this attempt at a substitute. Those who 
were in favor of a national bank and hoped that this 
might answer the purpose, thought that enough was 
said from the other side ; and many of them were 
wilhng to put their own money at risk in it, particu- 



12 



larly those who were nearest to the scene of action, 
in Philadelphia, and who are now among the greatest 
sufferers. 

There was one important fact that did not receive 
sufficient attention at the time. Similar plans, though 
not on so large a scale, had been formed in other 
states. Our people are apt to go on in a rush for new 
objects ; and such was the eagerness to take up the 
business left by the institution which was then closing 
its affairs, that the capital of new state banks, created 
for the purpose, was three or four times greater than 
that of the national one had been. When Mr. Biddle, 
therefore, attempted, in imitation of the latter, to 
establish branches in other states, by purchasing some 
smaller bank in each, he found competitors every- 
where ; and his intentions were defeated. He, then, 
began to feel the want of those exclusive privileges, 
throughout the Union, which the United States Bank 
had previously enjoyed, and which a single state could 
not give ; and he was induced, partly by this cause, 
perhaps, to employ a great deal of money in a kind of 
loans, for which banks were never designed, — long 
loans to states and to incorporated companies. 

The capital of the national bank and its branches 
was thirty-five milhons of dollars. The whole number 
of others that had been created, in the different states, 
for ten years before its close, was twenty-two, with a 
capital of eight millions. Within two years after its 
close, two hundred and sixty-eight banks were creat- 
ed, under the authority of the different state govern- 
ments, with capital amounting to a great deal more 
than one hundred millions. Many of the latter became 



13 



unsound, and their failure contributed to a depression 
in the value of property, that proved, in the sequel, 
ruinous to the credit of some of the states. 

Mr. Biddle went on in his own way. Instead of 
lending the money to commercial men, on their en- 
gagements, made for a short time, he lent it in immense 
sums to aid doubtful projects in various states ; mak- 
ing his power felt, as if to prepare political influence. 
I believe that he did not mean to do mischief, but he 
overrated his own sagacity and ability. When any of 
the directors were disposed to interfere, they felt that 
he was clothed with power from the distant stock- 
holders, and could control everything. The bank had 
become just what it was commonly called, " Biddle's 
Bank." Some independent men resigned, or were 
displaced. Concurrent circumstances, which it would 
be tedious to explain, proved unfavorable ; and, after 
a short career, this new bank, merely a creature of 
one of the states, was found to be insolvent. The 
mischief is done, and without remedy. Nobody but 
the stockholders at a distance, who had implicit confi- 
dence in Mr. Biddle, could interfere with him to pre- 
vent it. In my behef, the power could only come 
from abroad ; and it seems clear, that if the stock- 
holders in Europe had occasionally sent sensible men 
to look after their affairs, and to see how things were 
managed, the greater part of the loss would have been 
prevented. 

As the change from the national bank to that of the 
state was in some degree a matter of form only, you 
will ask, perhaps, as others have done, what evidence 
1 have that the misapplication of the funds, which is 



14 



admitted in the latter case, had not been practised 
long before ? I answer, the very best that could be 
desired ; and the statement of it will serve still farther 
to explain to you the distinction between the national 
bank and that which failed ; showing the safeguards 
that surrounded the one, and the want of them which 
proved fatal to the other. I assisted, myself, with the 
other directors of the several branches among which 
the capital of the national bank was divided, to guard 
the funds. The greater part of the thirty-five millions 
was distributed among the several cities of the Union, 
to a branch in each ; leaving only a small remainder 
in Philadelphia under the immediate control of the 
president, Mr. Biddle, and the directors, there, of the 
mother bank, as it was called. We had, for instance, 
one million and a half of this capital in Boston ; which 
it was our duty and our right to lend among the mer- 
chants here. If there had been any attempt to with- 
draw a part of it from our control, the community 
around us would have felt the diminution immediately, 
and we should have remonstrated. When the charter 
expired, the officers of our branch returned that 
amount to Philadelphia. Other branches did the same. 
Then, for the first time, the whole capital, or nearly 
so, was brought together in Pennsylvania ; and when 
Mr. Biddle moved forward again, under a charter 
from that state, he wielded a power over the whole 
thirty-five milUons that he never had possessed before. 
Those wholesome checks were removed which had 
previously existed in the various boards of directors 
attached to the several branches, who watched him as 
he did them ; and the disposal of the whole was after- 



15 



wards decided very much by his own will. You may 
be told that some of the distant branches at the West 
did not return their portions, making not quite one- 
fifth part of the capital ; and that there were great 
losses, eventually, there. Still, there is nothing in this 
that conflicts materially, with what I have told you, 
that the national bank was sound at its close. The 
losses there, were the consequences of the expansion 
and revulsion that followed some time afterwards. If 
the stockholders had decided to discontinue the busi- 
ness of the bank, when it had lost its national character, 
by far the greater part of this money at the West would 
have been received back. To recall it would have 
caused considerable inconvenience there ; but any 
losses that could possibly have been met with then 
would probably have been covered by the reserved 
profits. 

So much for the bank ; a grievous and mortifying 
business, but not so bad as if an institution corres- 
ponding to the Bank of England had broken down 
among us.* 

PUBLIC DEBTS. 

You doubtless hear much about our public debts ; 
and find " national bankruptcy," " bad faith," " repu- 
diation," and other hard words, applied to us without 
discrimination and without measure. A fair statement 



* The term limited for the National Bank of the United States expired in 
the year 1836, and for the two last years of this terra its operations were 
confined to the business of closing its affairs. 

The Bank of the United States, as it was called, created by the State of 
Pennsylvania, was chartered early in that year. 



16 



of leading facts will enable you to form an opinion of 
your own as to the justice of this. 

1 must again refer to the nature of our general gov- 
ernment, resulting from a union among the people of 
independent states for national purposes only. The 
question whether power was given to it to make roads, 
or other communications of national importance, was 
one of early interest. The opinion that it ivas given, 
rather prevailed at first, and some appropriations for 
purposes of this nature were made. President Jackson 
gave a decided opinion that it was not, and refused 
his assent to any further aid. The separate states, 
then, concluded that they must undertake such works 
for themselves. The great canal in New York, made 
through the influence of the governor, De Witt Clin- 
ton, from Lake Erie to the Hudson, was an example 
of this use of state power eminently successful. It is 
rare that the sagacity and skill of an individual, in his 
private affairs, lead to so profitable a result. Its in- 
come has been sufficient to pay all interest on the 
loans made by the state of New York for completing 
it, and rapidly to accumulate a fund for repaying the 
cost. It gave an impression that any one of the states 
could execute such a work within herself; and still 
further, that any great avenue through a state was 
hkely to be profitable. The sanguine behef of this 
had an unfortunate effect. 

Several of the states began operations in this way, 
and exercised their sovereign powers largely in bor- 
rowing money for these purposes. But they disre- 
garded one very important consideration, which was, 
indeed, likely to escape notice in the trial of a new 



17 



system. While they retained rights as separate gov- 
ernments, they had each rehnquished, for national 
uses, one important privilege of sovereignty, the right 
of raising revenue by duties on the importation of 
merchandise from abroad. The states of Pennsylvania 
and Maryland, for instance, are now deeply indebted. 
If the control of the custom-house in Philadelphia 
were given to the one, and of that in Baltimore to the 
other, their difficulties would vanish in a day. But 
that cannot be. The importations at those ports are 
not solely for their own use, but pass through them 
for the use of other states ; and the duties, of course, 
are paid to the government of the United States. 
This was not sufficiently thought of. 

Several of the states, which thus undertook canals 
and rail-roads, have found themselves unable to com- 
plete them ; and, therefore, fail to derive the revenue 
from them that they expected. They must now tax 
themselves to pay the interest on the loans ; and here 
comes the difficulty. There was, in most cases, a 
large party opposed to these undertakings. It was 
thought that they were too mighty ; that too many of 
them came together ; that some of them were ill con- 
ceived ; and that the people at large were not suffi- 
ciently aware what liabilities they were exposed to, in 
case of failure. Most of this has turned out to be 
true ; particularly the last point. The people were 
not fully aware that they might have to assume such 
heavy debts. Now that they are so, they do not refuse 
to admit their liability ; except in three cases, where 
it is denied, as to a part of the money, that authority 
to bind the states had been given. This is called 
3 



18 



repudiation ; and it is made to resound in Europe as 
if we were all guilty of it ; with what justice, you can 
judge when I tell you that while the whole debts of 
the states are two hundred and fourteen millions of 
dollars, the amount involved in these three cases, 
where the authority is disputed, is less than nine mil- 
hons. I do not believe that the people will sanction 
an improper refusal in any case. They intend to 
make provision for all that is due. It is true that they 
seem to be long in doing so ; but when you hear it 
said that the whole nation is bankrupt, that we are all 
swindlers, and knaves, &c., just bear in mind, for your 
own consolation, the truth as it is. 

NATIONAL DEBTS. 

First, the national government is not involved in 
the loans that I have mentioned. It has always per- 
formed its engagements. It has, at one time, within 
your day, been burthened with an immense debt, about 
two hundred milhons of dollars ; and has paid every 
dollar of it, principal and interest. For several years 
afterward, it was entirely free from debt. But, owing 
to some changes in revenue laws, &c., it lately requir- 
ed a new loan of a moderate sum, less than its income 
for a single year. The capitalists in Europe declined 
lending this ; partly, perhaps, from real doubts of the 
solidity of our institutions, and partly, probably, with a 
view to make us all feel discredit so sensibly, that our 
national government should be induced to assume, as 
it has no right to do, the debts of the delinquent states. 
The money was lent, however, by our own people ; 



19 



and the only subject of regret with them is, that the 
government will not keep it longer than it is likely to 
do. Every man who has lent it a hundred dollars, 
can now receive one hundred and fourteen for the 
engagement that he holds. Our national government, 
then, is not bankrupt ; but has performed all its en- 
gagements with punctuality and honor. 

DEBTS OF SEPARATE STATES. 

Next, let us look at the separate governments of the 
states. There are twenty-six of them. Beginning at 
the north, on the line of the British territory, Maine 
has a small debt, perfectly safe ; and if any one, to 
whom a part of it is due, wishes for the money, he can 
have it, and more, from others who stand ready to 
purchase his security. Massachusetts is responsible 
for a considerable amount, raised, however, for great 
public works, that are now completed and productive ; 
and her engagements are perfectly good. Those who 
hold them, can dispose of them without loss ; and, for 
this state, I can assure you that we mean never to 
suffer her name to bear discredit. New Hampshire, 
Vermont, Connecticut, and Rhode Island are free of 
debt to Europe. New York owes a large amount 
still ; but it rests chiefly on the security of her great 
canals, and there is no delinquency there. New Jersey 
owes nothing. 

Here, then, from the St. John's river, at the extreme 
north, up to your own beautiful Delaware, are eight 
states, nearly one-third of the whole Union, either 
entirely free from debt, or performing all their obliga- 



20 



tions. We then come to Pennsylvania. She owes a 
great amount (expended rather unprofitably,) and 
ought to provide for paying it, for she has still great 
wealth ; and I think she will do so. But, although 
the delay casts discredit on us all, nobody, out of the 
state, can interfere to direct her measures. The 
failure of her own great bank, which I have described, 
reduced many of her principal people to poverty ; and 
she has within her limits a large German population, 
still speaking only their own language, ignorant of 
much that relates to national character or reputation 
abroad, and not easily convinced of the necessity of 
taxation for the payment of such debts ; but wielding 
a political power that outweighs the influence of all 
the gentlemen in Philadelphia. If the decision lay 
with the latter, provision would be promptly made. 

Maryland is deeply indebted ; and being neither a 
large, nor a very productive state, 1 apprehend that 
she must struggle hard to clear herself. Virginia 
owes a considerable sum, but has met her engage- 
ments, though occasionally, perhaps, with difficulty. 
North Carolina owes nothing. South Carolina has 
borrowed money, but pays punctually. 

Without taking you the full round of the states, I 
may say, in short terms, that two-thirds of them are 
either out of debt, or pay punctually what they have 
engaged to pay ; and that one-third, or less, of them 
have failed, not to repay their loans, for they are not 
yet due, but to pay the interest on them, under the 
following circumstances : 

There had been a simultaneous impulse in a large 
number of states to engage in great works, absorbing, 



21 



together, an immense amount of European capital ; 
when one or two should have been suffered to com- 
plete their enterprises, and render them productive, 
before others began. 

Then, some of these works, as the plans became 
developed, have been found to conflict with others. 
Prudence required that they should be abandoned, 
even if the means for completing them were at hand. 
Some of them have been given up. Of course, what 
had been expended on these is entirely lost. 

In addition to these circumstances, other causes 
were at work, about the same time, to produce a 
great depression in the value of all property in this 
country ; so that it has been a much more difficult 
matter than is generally supposed, for several of the 
states, from the day of their first discredit, nearly up 
to the present time, to meet their engagements, how- 
ever they may have wished to do so. 

The great increase of loans from Europe to the 
states here had begun to make the want of money felt 
there, and the payment of all debts actually due from 
this country was urgently pressed. The unfortunate 
bank in Pennsylvania just described, overloaded with 
unmanageable securities, fell and was crushed when 
pubhc confidence was shaken. Thirty-five millions 
were thus withdrawn from use, before the country was 
fully aware of it. Fifteen millions of the most valua- 
ble commercial property in the city of New York had 
been annihilated by a terrific fire ; and the mischief, 
from which that city has scarcely yet entirely recover- 
ed, was heightened by unwise attempts to go on as if 
nothing had happened. If every man who received 



22 



his death-blow on that occasion had confessed it and 
failed, twenty millions less of property would probably 
have been imported from Europe in the following 
year, which was eventually paid for at such an ad- 
vance in the rate of exchange as was scarcely ever 
heard of here before. 

The dominant party in politics, when they put an 
end to the bank of the United States, had resolved, if 
possible, to substitute gold and silver coins for bank 
bills in all payments. You will easily perceive that, 
so far as they succeeded, they very much diminished 
the quantity of what had passed as money. For, as 
bank bills had been received for dollars, if their use 
were abolished, the number of dollars must be greatly 
reduced. A large number of minor banks had failed, 
too, and ceased to furnish a circulating medium. 
Thus, each dollar was made to represent a greater 
amount of property than it had done before. That is, 
property fell in value, surprisingly. Where a bushel 
of corn had procured a dollar before, two bushels, or 
more, were required afterward. Yet the dollar, when 
obtained, would go no further than it had ever done, 
in cancelhng an old debt. Think, then, of the situa- 
tion of newly-settled states, like Indiana and Illinois, 
beyond the Alleghany Mountains ; and what was the 
natural language of the inhabitants, until the present 
year, when their affairs are improving. They went 
there to settle, because they were poor. They had 
become prosperous, but not yet rich. " We meant no 
dishonesty," they said, " in borrowing this money. 
We were told that the canals and rail-roads would 
repay it. Had we understood the real danger, we 



23 



would not have suffered the loans to be made. We 
find ourselves indebted to a frightful amount, for 
works that are rather premature in a new country ; 
and, at the same moment, we find, from a change of 
currency, that the surplus of our products, from which 
we were deriving wealth, has become of too little 
value to bear the cost of transportation to a market. 
To tax ourselves, would look well ; but it would be al- 
most useless. Unless we can sell our produce, the tax 
could not be paid. We may offer our property for 
sale, but there are no purchasers at any price. The 
money is not here." This was very much the lan- 
guage that they were obliged to use with respect to 
their private debts. I speak of it as merely temporary ; 
and it could never have been used, with justice, in 
Pennsylvania. 

The case, however, is not unhke one that frequently 
happens in the affairs of individual men. The capi- 
talist, tempted by a high rate of interest, lends more 
money than is prudent to an enterprising, sanguine 
man, who undertakes too much, and finds that he 
cannot get on. The capitalist looks into the matter ; 
perceives that the man meant fairly ; finds that, though 
both parties have been imprudent, the schemes in 
themselves are good ; and concludes that his wisest 
way is, to lend more money to complete them. If the 
same thing is now proposed by the states, they are 
asked if they suppose the people in Europe " are so 
easily duped " as to do that. They are told to apply 
first to their own general government to guaranty the 
payment of their debts. This is about as reasonable 
as it would be to ask Queen Victoria, in England, to 



24 



assume a few of the powers of the Pope, in order to 
settle the affairs of Ireland. It probably never can be 
done ; for it was never intended to give the national 
government that power. The proposal is mischievous 
to the creditors, who hope to be benefited by it ; for 
it tends to relax exertions of another nature, on which 
their best reliance is founded. I mean the exertions 
of those states who owe the money, and who must 
repay it from their own means. It is best that the 
world should now understand on whom alone they 
have to depend, in lending money to one of our states. 
And if the consequence should be, that no future loan 
should ever be made us from Europe, it would, per- 
haps, be rather fortunate than otherwise for us all. I 
should be very glad to know that such might be the 
result. 

It is said that we are indifferent to the disgrace of 
our position. I think that the imputation is unjust. 
Our pubhc men omit no opportunity of enlarging 
upon it, and urging speedy payment. Our men of 
education and property use their influence to the same 
end. Each one, however, has but a vote ; and that 
can only be used in his own state, where, perhaps, all 
engagements have been faithfully met. Let me offer 
my own case, as an instance. A considerable amount 
of money from Europe has been under my control in 
this country, and is duly repaid. In one case I caused 
a large sum to be invested in an old-fashioned security, 
called bond and mortgage, for a British peer, who had 
asked my advice. It remained here several years, 
yielding punctually the rate of interest that was looked 
for ; and when recalled lately, was all safely returned, 



26 



to the last dollar. The state in which 1 live, and the 
national government, through which it is represented 
to the world, are, as I have explained to you, both of 
them free from reproach in all pecuniary affairs. In 
these three relations, then, private and political, I have 
a right to exemption from blame. Yet I find myself 
involved, with the rest of the nation, in indiscriminate 
censure, because some of those who unite with us 
under the same government, in Pennsylvania and 
Mississippi, are dehnquent. Still, I have no power to 
act there. The debts are too mighty for any private 
subscription to be of use. If the city of Edinburgh 
were indebted to foreigners for money borrowed for 
improvements of her own, the city of London would 
hardly undertake to repay it ; nor would the ministry 
consent that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should 
include it in his estimate for supplies from the parlia- 
ment. Neither can it be expected, then, that one 
state will pay for another ; or that the nation will pay 
for either. When the money was lent, these distinc- 
tions were clearly perceived ; and a higher rate of 
interest was required and allowed, for the very reason 
that the faith of the nation was not pledged. To 
affect not to comprehend them now, is something 
worse than idle. 

On the whole, nothing can be done but by each de- 
linquent state, acting separately ; and I have hopes 
that they will do all that is requisite at no distant 
period ; for they seem to me to be fast recovering 
from the misfortunes that have embarrassed them, and 
indeed actually disabled most of them, within the last 
six years. 

4 



26 



However humbling the delay* may be to us all, 1 
think that those who will examine the subject, will be 
convinced that, at least, there was no intention among 
any of us to defraud. 

You might suppose, from what you hear said, that 
no individual among us could get credit from Europe 
for any sum, however small. Quite the reverse is the 
truth. In commerce, our people get credit as far as 
it is at all desirable. Although much of the evil that 
has befallen our commercial world of late, has arisen 
from the dangerous facility of obtaining foreign capi- 
tal, there are now agents of European bankers in this 
country, ready, for a small commission, to furnish 
credit for new enterprises to the full extent to which 
it is prudent for any of us to engage in them. If 1 
were to describe to you the readiness with which 
credit has been furnished here by foreign agents, I 
may say the imprudence and folly with which it has 
been urged upon the inexperienced among us within 
fifteen years past, through a novel invention for trad- 
ing in any part of the world with no other capital than 
a bill on London, you would be less surprised at the 
number of engagements that have been broken here 
than at the vast amount of those that have been faith- 
fully met under all the embarrassments alluded to. 

* Kote to 3rf Edition. — Since this letter was published the Legislature of 
Pennsylvania have passed a lavir for taxation and the sale of property that 
will probably make ample provision for the debts of that state. 



27 



BOOKS OF TRAVELLERS. 



You ask if the accounts given of us by Captain 
Marryat and Mr. Dickens can be just ; and add that, 
if so, the country must have been sadly changed since 
you left it. But if you should come among us again, 
I think you v^^ould say that we have not changed for 
the worse, but rather improved, notwithstanding their 
descriptions. In his answer to the Edinburgh Review, 
Captain Marryat says, " My great object was to do 
serious injury to democracy. To effect this, it w^as 
necessary that I should write a book which should be 
universally read. I wrote the work with this object ; 
and I wrote it accordingly." He lets it be understood 
that " the occasional, and apparently careless hits at 
democracy, in the jfirst part," had an important aim, 
and were only preparatory to others more severe in 
the second part, which would be read, he thought, 
with equal avidity, if made amusing. With such law- 
yer-hke skill as he possessed, he made the most of his 
case on the part of monarchy, and presented the worst 
side of ours. 

If you take Mr. Dickens's account, you will think 
very unfavorably of us ; and if you take his account of 
England, you will not think at all better of the state of 
society there. His style partakes of caricature ; and 
he seems more desirous to fill out the picture that he 
offers to the reader with matter for amusement and 
wonder, than to present an accurate view of facts. 
He says that a party in Boston is very much like a 
party in London ; but he describes the people whom 
he saw in the steam-boats as uncouth in their man- 



28 



ners, and disagreeable. He says, " They put their 
knives in their mouths," &c., and he did not hke to sit 
at the cabin-table with them. Now, how would it be 
with such people in Europe ? Probably they would 
not be seen in the cabin at all. They would be deck 
passengers, at half price. Mr. Dickens might say that 
they would be in their proper place. They would say, 
themselves, that they have now the advantage of see- 
ing others who may have enjoyed greater privileges, 
and have thus an opportunity of learning something. 
And many of them do learn. They receive almost an 
education from society. There is a constant advance- 
ment, going forward here, upwards, from the condition 
and habits of the mere laborer to the manners and 
intelligence of wealth and cultivation. Men who have 
commenced their career in boyhood with little instruc- 
tion and without a penny, are sending their children 
to colleges or to travel in Europe ; and I could give 
you instances of such people becoming, themselves, 
efficient patrons of the fine arts. After the dainty 
aversion with which these gentlemen looked upon 
those whom they met in traveUing, it is agreeable to 
remember the remark of an English lady, widow of an 
officer, I beheve, in her diary of a trip through this 
country. She says, " After all, I like the Americans. 
They are warm-hearted in the interest that they show 
towards their fellow-travellers. They are kind and 
ready to oblige. If they are inquisitive, they are 
equally ready to communicate ; and the interchange is 
frequently quite agreeable." 



29 



LOVE OF MONEY. 



When it is said, as it often is, with scorn, that our 
conversation, in this country, relates too much to 
money matters, that we talk about dollars, &c., it is 
but fair to remember that, notwithstanding all that 
some of our own writers have thought proper to con- 
cede, money is regarded here as the means of progress 
rather than the end in view. It is power in any part 
of the world ; and where difference of rank is abolished, 
and the highest places are open to the competition of 
every one, it is great power, since it enables a man to 
raise those who depend upon him to the enjoyments 
and advantages of which he may have felt the want. 
Probably there is no part of the world where the 
character of the miser is more uncommon than here ; 
and I have often thought, in noticing the ways of 
foreigners who come here, that, if we talk more about 
dollars than they do, they think more of them than we 
do, by far. 

GRAVITY OF MANNERS. 

As a consequence of the eagerness for money, sup- 
posed to exist among us, it is said that our people 
have no mirth in their character. Still, they have 
mirth enough among themselves, although a foreigner 
may not be likely to elicit it by the kind of address 
with which he encourages the peasantry at home to a 
jest. The people here do not thank him for his con- 
descension. A German baron, who was collecting 
materials for a book about us, once repeated this 



so 



remark upon our gravity, to me. " Oh ! " he said, 
" if you could only see the people in my country 
dance ! when notice is given, on the estate of some 
great landholder, that there will be music. It is yvith 
all their soul." I took him to Lowell, a large manu- 
facturing town, where six thousand girls are employed 
in spinning and weaving cotton, of whom an English- 
man, familiar with manufactures at home, once 
remarked to me, that he " should not have supposed 
that any of those young women had ever seen a cotton 
factory ; that they rather resembled, in appearance, 
the daughters of middling men, shopkeepers, &c., in 
England." As we passed through the country, the 
German inquired of me as to the wages of the laborers 
in the fields. I told him they were twelve or fifteen 
dollars a month, beside board and lodging ; and that 
the industrious and enterprising often obtained more 
and became owners of land themselves, early in hfe. 
" Indeed !" said he, " Now, in my country, if a man 
received fifteen dollars for a year, with a pair or two 
of shoes, and a small supply of flour, he would expect 
nothing more." At Lowell, he made similar inquiries 
as to the wages of the factory girls. 1 told him that 
they were about a dollar and a half per week, besides 
an allowance that procures them comfortable board 
and lodging ; and that the most industrious and skillful 
frequently obtain nearly double that sum. He express- 
ed surprise ; and remarked, that a young woman in 
his country would be satisfied with the usual supply of 
shoes and flour, and five or six dollars fo7' a ivhole 
year ! I then asked him, whether, if the peasants in 
his country could obtain the same wages as our labor- 



31 



ing people do, (the pay of a whole year in a month, 
with the prospect of greatly increasing it by industry 
and care,) they would continue to take the same inter- 
est in dancing ? He answered, " Most certainly they 
would not." I told him that I could show him people, 
on the estates of great landholders, in this country, 
who enjoy dancing with all the light-hearted mirth 
that he spoke of; whose festivities at Christmas, for 
instance, perhaps exceed in gayety those of any other 
people on earth. But, for the present, they are slaves! 
divested of political rights and of hope, as they are of 
care for the future. 

SLAVERY. 

We are reproached with the slavery that exists in 
the South ; and particularly by the English, who point 
to the West Indies, and tell us what they have done. 
And what is that ? In England, where there is no 
slavery, but where the power to control the whole 
empire resides, it was determined that a fixed sum 
should be raised, and that the planters should be com- 
pelled to take it, or take nothing, and free their 
negroes. If the same sum could rid us of the evil, it 
would very soon be raised. But just suppose a case 
parallel to ours ; that the West India islands had been 
represented in parliament when this vote was passed ; 
that nearly one-half of the House of Commons had 
consisted of planters, and that exactly one-half of the 
House of Lords had been made up of such nobles as a 
duke of Jamaica, a marquis of Trinidad, an earl of 
Barbadoes, &c. I think you will believe, with me, 



32 



that, up to this day, no vote for any such measure 
could have been obtained there. Our difficulties on 
the subject are of this nature. Nearly one-half of the 
national House of Representatives, and exactly one- 
half of the Senate, are men who expect to have their 
own throats cut, with those of their wives and chil- 
dren, as an immediate consequence of any sudden 
emancipation ; while the other half have neither the 
power nor the right to control them in this matter. 
The action of the national government being limited 
to certain particulars essential for union and foreign 
intercourse, it has no authority to change the domes- 
tic institutions of either of the states. Any approach 
to interference from the free states, therefore, is worse 
than useless ; for it tends to blind the people of the 
South, by giving the aspect of a mere domestic quar- 
rel to a question that exists between the slave-holder 
and the human race. It impedes the current of a 
broader influence, which I heard recognized, not long 
ago, by a legislator at the South, in a debate upon a 
new regulation in respect to property in negroes. 
When I expected to hear only an explosion of wrath 
against the Northern States, he exclaimed without 
referring to them, — "I beg the senate to pause. 
The eyes of the ivorld are upon us in this matter. 
The spirit of the age is against us." 

Mr. Dickens, having been annoyed by some simple 
people who asked him whether he did not admire the 
heads of our lawmakers at Washington, asserts that 
an eminent and venerable statesman had, just before, 
stood for days upon his trial in Congress, " charged 
with having dared to assert the infamy of that traffic 



33 



which has, for its accursed merchandise, men and 
women with their unborn children." It is not true ; 
and it is discreditable to him to have made the asser- 
tion ; for, as he says, the occurrence alluded to took 
place within a week of his date of the account of it ; 
and he might have ascertained the facts without 
trouble. Mr. Adams, formerly president of the United 
States, but now a national representative, whom he 
describes in a way not to be mistaken, had presented, 
on the floor of Congress, a petition, from some people 
in an Eastern town, for the dissolution of the Union ; 
that is, the overthrow of our national government. 
Members were thunderstruck. It appeared that he 
had no wish that the prayer should be granted ; but, 
in his zeal for the right of petition, he dared to go to 
a length that seemed to his own friends like high trea- 
son. All that he said on this occasion, about the 
abhorrence of Slavery, which was the ground of the 
petition, had been said by him repeatedly before, and 
nobody thought of putting him on trial. But his pres- 
ent movement was like offering, in the British Parlia- 
ment, a petition from Mr. O'Connell and his friends, 
not that Ireland might be suffered peaceably to with- 
draw from the British empire, but that the crown 
should be taken from the head of Queen Victoria, and 
Great Britain carried back to the state of things in the 
time of Hengist and Horsa, or the Heptarchy, or incur 
the risk of any other subdivision that might happen to 
ensue. A vote of censure was proposed. Mr. Adams 
defended himself with his usual ability, and the matter 
was dropped ; which, I think you will readily believe, 
5 



34 



would not have been the case, without a more serious 
trial, if it had occurred in the British parliament. 

This may serve as an instance of the inaccuracy of 
Mr. Dickens. He, probably, does not mean to mis- 
represent. But he writes like a man who has not that 
habitual respect for the weight of his own opinion 
which would make him careful to ascertain its accu- 
racy before he utters it. If it would not be tedious 
to you, I should show you that, whether he speaks of 
the mode of travelling by rail-roads, or the means by 
which our statesmen and office-holders obtain their 
places, he is so heedlessly unjust that one can gather 
but little that is certain from the greater part of his 
book. 

LYNCH LAW, &c. 

After all, the most important question seems to be 
are we improving? I think we have evidence that 
we are, although some, even of our own men, would 
say not. 

Captain Hall, fifteen years ago, complained that the 
people in the stage-coaches drank so much brandy as 
to be quite offensive. Mr. Dickens now complains, 
that such is the rigid practice of temperance in the 
country that he could not get brandy and water for 
his own use, on some occasion, when the coach 
stopped. When people can recover from evil habits 
by their own will, they give some evidence of being 
qualified for self-government. 1 could give you many 
proofs of improvement, in this respect and others, 
among the main body of the people, both in the older 



35 



states and the new settlements ; and it is important 
to enquire, when you hear instances of misconduct 
among us, whether they occur in the new settlements. 

Captain Marryat, in the first part of his work, tells a 
story of vulgar behavior in a lady, of which he re- 
marks, in his second part, that complaints have been 
made of him for telling such a story, as if it could not 
be true. But he says the reader will please to re- 
mark, that he had stated the occurrence to have taken 
place in Arkansas. It is true that he did so ; but few 
readers in Europe attach any importance to the dis- 
tinction between one part of the Union and another, 
in such matters. Arkansas is a new state, beyond the 
Mississippi, a thousand miles from Boston ; and, with- 
in our own day, it was a wild waste, newly purchased 
from the French. It has been settled partly by Cre- 
oles of Louisiana, and partly by needy emigrants, 
who have not yet enjoyed the full advantages of edu- 
cation, and whose errors in manners are no proof that 
we are generally uncivihzed. 

The greatest enormities that you hear of amongst 
us have occurred in those parts of the country where 
the pioneers of new settlements have found it neces- 
sary, habitually, to practise something of Indian war- 
fare, in self-defence. This circumstance has an unfa- 
vorable influence on manners, but it wears out in a 
generation, as the settlements fill up. One conse- 
quence of it has been an irregularity, which, under 
the name of " Lynch laiv,^^ has a very flagrant aspect. 
The instances of it have generally occurred where 
profligate vagabonds, who hve by gambhng, plunder, 
and villany, in the new states, have united in such 



36 



numerous and powerful fraternities, that it became 
impossible to execute the laws upon them ; and the 
industrious and honest portion of the community have 
been in a manner compelled, for their own security, 
to take the law into their own hands, and inflict sum- 
mary punishment, even by death, upon the criminals. 
That such a mode of proceeding is highly dangerous 
as a precedent, and that it has been resorted to in two 
or three cases that admit of no excuse or palliation, 
cannot be denied. But, that there is as yet no proof 
from this of our being in the habit of destroying each 
other at pleasure, by mere denunciation to the mob, 
as some people represent, you will the more readily 
believe, when I tell you that even Captain Marryat, 
with all his desire to make out a case against us, looks 
with no disfavor upon Lynch law. In speaking of 
those distant settlements in the South and remote 
West, he says, " The rapid increase of population, and 
the many respectable people who have lately migrated 
there, promise very soon to produce a change. 
Natchez, the lower town of which was a Pandemo- 
nium, has cleansed herself to a great extent. Vicks- 
burg has, by its salutary Lynch law, relieved herself of 
the infamous gamblers ; and New Orleans, in whose 
streets murders were daily occurring, is now one of 
the safest towns in the Union." Still, this same 
Lynch law is an irregularity, the approach of which 
cannot be regarded without alarm ; such alarm as 
speedily brings its own remedy. We know well, that 
no people can exist long, who habitually sufl'er the 
mob to take the law into their own hands. It is about 
eight years since the first instance occurred at Vicks- 



37 



burg on the Mississippi, and we have now learned the 
extent of the danger. I shall show you presently, in 
speaking of mobs, that when a similar disposition, 
without the same excuse, shows itself elsewhere, as we 
have warning that it may, there is both the power and 
the will to put it down. 

SUCCESS OF OUR FORM OF GOVERNMENT. 

Captain Marryat tells you, in his second part, that 
we have made " a miserable failure" in our attempt 
at a republic ; and others cry out the same. Mr. 
Dickens, in a late number of his " Martin Chuzzlewit," 
the book that he has now in hand, says, — " that 
republic, but yesterday let loose upon her noble course, 
and but to-day so maimed and lame, so full of sores 
and ulcers, that her best friends turn from the loath- 
some creature in disgust !" Hard words, these ! to 
be applied to a republic that has stood firm in war ; 
that, in peace, has honorably discharged every debt, 
as 1 have shown you, for which her national faith was 
pledged ; that gives her citizens all the protection they 
desire, at home and abroad ; and asks nothing of her 
friends but to enquire into the truth when they hear 
her reviled. They are odd words, too, to come from 
a writer who has been complaining of " ribald slander" 
from the presses of the daily journals. They even 
suggest the thought, that the greatest abuse of the art 
of printing, just now, may not be, after all, among 
" cheap newspapers." 

If we have attempted, as some people from Europe 
seem resolved to charge us with having done, and as 



38 



some silly newspaper editors among us would have it 
believed, to present ourselves to the world as choice 
Greeks and Romans, with a patrician air, divested of 
its pride, among the rich, and every man at the plough 
looking as if he had the part of Cincinnatus to per- 
form, we certainly have failed. But we have simply 
attempted to inhabit a country of vast extent, compris- 
ing all varieties of character, from the frozen North to 
the Tropic, with as little government as is absolutely 
necessary to enable every man to pursue his own 
business in quiet, and to secure to him and his family 
the fruits of his own industry. And I maintain that 
we have been successful in the attempt. It may seem 
presumptuous for any of us to make an assertion on 
the subject. But, since you ask for an opinion as to 
the justice of the charges against us, we may as well 
give one, as those who denounce us. Many of them, 
by the way, might have failed to discover in Cincinna- 
tus, if they had seen him as he was, a character that 
was to be admired by the latest posterity ; and 
although they can perceive nobody like him among us, 
it is quite possible that we may have men living in 
quiet obscurity, who would be ready and able to do all 
that he did, if there were need for them to act. 

Conceding everything that the philosophers or poli- 
ticians, who rail at us, can urge with justice against 
us, on the grounds of selfishness, love of money, dis- 
honesty, coarse manners, tyranny of public opinion, 
insecurity of property, frequency of elections, disorder, 
violence. Lynch law and all, I assert that we are as 
successful, so far, in what we really undertook to do, 
as any people could ever reasonably expect to be in 



39 



the same time, who pass from one form of government 
to another that was before untried.* I really believe 
that if we had concluded to adopt the old form of king, 
nobility and commons, and had been only as success- 
ful with that as we have been with what was actually 
designed by our present one, our government would 
have been admitted to come nearer to what a mon- 
archy should be than most others that exist. It is re- 
markable that we have found but few changes of form 
necessary, where we might have expected that many 
parts would prove defective. We talk of scarcely any 
change but one which should prevent the re-election 
of the president ; and that can easily be shown to be 
unadvisable, as those who framed our constitution de- 
cided that it was, after mature dehberation. 

Let us see. Selfishness and love of money ! — I have 
already remarked that the eagerness for wealth among 
us is not altogether base in its nature, since its object 
is change and improvement of condition. 

The foreigner comes here prepossessed with expec- 
tations founded upon his own notions of an ideal 
republic, and is disappointed in what he sees. " These 
people are all selfish," he says, " each one looking out 
for himself only, in a general scramble. Your republi- 
canism is all humbug." It might be so, if we had 
undertaken to alter the nature of man. But we have 
aimed at nothing so imaginary. They who framed 
our institutions knew that man is selfish. The his- 
tories of all republics and monarchies, and if I may 
say so, the natural history of the animal, had taught 

* See Note at the end. 



40 



them this ; and they dealt with him accordingly. 
They knew that each one is likely to monopolize 
wealth and power, as far as he can, for himself; and 
they have left him at liberty to do so. But they give 
him no aid from the laws to perpetuate either, beyond 
that security for property to which every one is enti- 
tled. He may make himself as powerful as he can 
(even as a king, perhaps) ; but his power ceases with 
his office, and he can transmit nothing of it to his 
descendants. He may raise a mountain of wealth if 
he can ; but the laws fence it with no entail that can- 
not easily be broken. They allow his children and 
grand-children to make mole-hills of it ; which they do 
very soon, and go to work for themselves when they 
find it necessary. We know that nothing can ever 
cure improper selfishness in man, but the Christian 
religion. If any people have discovered a mode of 
bringing that into daily, practical use, as the rule of 
action, in its true spirit, throughout society, we shall 
be glad to learn of them. We beheve that it will be 
sufficient to correct all evils in politics under any form 
of government, democratic or despotic, and render 
the manners of every individual, in his own sphere of 
action, whether it be high or low, beautifully appro- 
priate. In the mean time, we leave with every man 
his own responsibiUty to his Maker; and only take 
care that he shall do no harm to anybody but himself. 
Under this arrangement we see a vast deal to regret, 
and, if possible, to remedy. But it is not particularly 
when we reflect on what other nations have brought 
to pass, that we feel most humbled or anxious. 

Dishonesty! — So far as we are guilty, let us be 



41 



scourged without mercy. But to the question how 
far dishonesty exists, I answer that, in my beUef, of 
the milUons of contracts that are daily made among 
us, as large a portion are faithfully executed as in any 
country. Recollect that everything is in action here, 
and engagements more numerous than elsewhere ; 
that thousands of needy European adventurers, from 
the time of the first settlements, have been pouring in 
among us to find subsistence ; and that the contest 
for property is open to every one here, with the hope 
of elevation ; while, under other forms of government, 
the great mass of the people have litde to do with 
bargaining of any sort. After all that is said against 
us, I believe that the faithful performance of engage- 
ments, according to the fair understanding of them, is 
as generally the standard of action here as elsewhere ; 
and that the tone of feeling in that respect has, on the 
whole, been rather raised than lowered, in the last 
fifty years.* 

As to coarseness of maimers, there certainly is room 
for improvement ; and if travellers can cure our 
people of the unnecessary trick of spitting, and of 
talking of dollars and business before ladies, they have 
free leave to abuse us to their own satisfaction, in all 
such matters. But there is one distinction that 

* Extract of a letter, concerning public and private credit in the United 
States, from a commercial house in England, of great respectability and of 
extensive correspondence in Europe and America, written on the receipt 
of a copy, from a former edition, of this pamphlet : — 

" In matters of Commerce, we, at all events, can testify tliat no country 
or people has afforded to us such uniform experience, not merely of ujjright- 
ness, but of that frank and confiding spirit in the transactions of business, 
which we consider to be the common evidence and the natural fruit of a 
high order both of sense and principle." 

6 



42 



deserves notice. In Europe, vulgarity is classed by 
itself, and is generally to be found where one would 
expect nothing better. In this country, where there 
is no difference of caste strongly marked, and where 
many people are in a kind of transition state, it is 
likely to be met with out of place, and, from mere 
mixture in the mass, it gives an impression of a more 
general want of refinement than can justly be charged 
to us. 

PUBLIC OPINION. 

The tyranny of public opinion is matter of triumph- 
ant outcry against us in Europe. It is very likely 
that you may be puzzled to know what is meant by 
this ; for, as it is in political matters, so, on almost 
every other subject of any public interest, we gener- 
ally have two or more parties, who stoutly maintain 
their own views in opposition to each other ; with a 
sufficient number of those nondescripts who are so 
peculiar in their own opinions that they cannot agree 
with any party. I should suppose that any peculiarity 
that exists among us in this respect, amounts to noth- 
ing more tlian this. In Europe, where everything 
appears to stand firmly upon established forms, a man 
may find fault and give his opinion freely, for the very 
reason that it goes for little, and changes nothing. In 
this country, where public action results from a com- 
bination of individual opinions, people who assume 
positions opposed to others are expected to maintain 
them, and to hold themselves in readiness to act con- 
sistently. They, therefore, speak with something of 



43 



caution. It is not, that they have less personal inde- 
pendence than people of corresponding stations in 
Europe ; but that it requires more to take a separate 
stand, where there are but few of the old entrench- 
ments of society for them to retire within, if pressed. 

The foreign traveller sees, for instance, what seems 
to him to be wrong among us, and asks the next man 
whom he meets, on the subject. If they are alone, it 
is likely enough the man may agree with him, yet do 
nothing. If there are others present, very likely the 
man may speak with something of reserve, instead of 
open censure ; and the traveller notes down " selfish 
indifference" in the one case, or " want of freedom 
of opinion" in the other. So many particulars of 
these cases have been given us by travellers, that it is 
not difficult for a careful observer to understand to 
what class the unlucky respondent may belong ; and 
although little attention ever seems to be paid to that 
circumstance, it is an important one. 

The man is most likely to be one who has newly 
risen to his own position, and who has hardly yet 
secured so firm a foot-hold that he is ready to set the 
world about him to rights. He probably remembers 
the matter, however, and subsequently uses his influ- 
ence to produce a change ; unless he discovers in the 
mean time, that there are reasons, which had escaped 
his sagacity and that of the foreigner, why a sudden 
change would not be productive of good. 

It may be, that the man is of high standing in 
society, but of little political influence ; disappointed 
that his own opinion, and that of his friends should 
have less weight than seems due, and therefore ready 



44 



to complain in private, though not inchned to inter- 
fere with the course of affairs ; a member, for instance, 
of the old Federal party, whom travellers are par- 
ticularly fond of quoting, the party of which Wash- 
ington was the head, out-voted by the followers of 
Jefferson. That party stood on the principles that are 
probably the safest for our institutions ; principles to 
which all parties, since, are sometimes compelled to 
resort. But its elder members, since their defeat, 
have been too ready to despair of our eventual suc- 
cess ; for, although we are not doing the best that we 
might, it does not follow that we are going headlong 
to destruction, as some of them apprehend. It is 
natural enough, that they should not be loud in 
expressing views which would draw them into collision 
with others, since they choose to consider themselves 
absolved from all responsibility for the event, and 
excused from all serious efforts to prevent it. I know 
how they talk, for 1 was one of the party, myself, 
though too young at its dissolution to feel at hberty to 
sit quietly down and lament, instead of keeping up 
with the transitions of the age, and taking a part in 
what has been going on. 

They have some right to complain, however. If 
the affairs of the country had been administered as 
they would have had them, it probably would not be 
necessary to assert, at this day, that we have suc- 
ceeded. It might have been conceded by acclama- 
tion, that we had given reality to the ideal that we 
were supposed to have imagined. The leaders of 
that party, formed by circumstances, with fresh recol- 
lections of the old school for a standard, united to the 



46 



vigor of free action on a field newly opened, were 
fitted to respond to the expectations of foreigners who 
wished to observe the chief ornaments of our society. 
They are passing away, with the personal respect of 
those opposed to them ; and are succeeded by men of 
less polished exterior, though, perhaps, equally able 
and useful. The tone of manners does not rise so 
high in some instances as formerly ; but the standard 
of society, on an average of ail classes, is unquestion- 
ably raised. 

On the whole, the encounter of an individual with 
public opinion may be more formidable in a republic 
than elsewhere ; but, depend upon it, the iron rule of 
this tyrant, that is said to keep us all in mental slavery, 
is in a great degree imaginary. 

SECURITY OF PROPERTY. 

As to the insecurity of property here, there have 
been some defects in the laws as to provision for com- 
pensation, by the public, to those whose property may 
have been injured in a riot. The defects have been 
in some degree supplied, since the necessity has been 
felt ; and I hope they will be so completely. Corpo- 
rate bodies are regarded with great jealousy, as rem- 
nants of the old system of monopoly. There have 
been some judicial decisions concerning their exclu- 
sive rights that have given dissatisfaction ; and there 
are here, as everywhere, some people who insist, 
when the laws are not administered as they would 
have them, that there is no law at all in the country ; 
which foreigners are very ready to repeat, and which 



46 



many of our women and children are made sorrowfully 
to believe. But any man who understands the subject 
will probably tell you, on calm consideration, that 
there is no country in the world where the people 
generally hold their houses, lands, and goods in more 
undisturbed security, and with less real cause for 
apprehension of any illegal interference, than here. 
The mass of the people are interested to maintain this 
security, for those of full age have property of their 
own. The young hope to obtain it ; not as something 
to be snatched at for momentary gratification, but as 
the reward of laborious attention and severe exertion, 
the foundation of rational and permanent enjoyment. 
Some people of property would dispute what I say, 
but not one of them would pay a premium to be 
assured against any risks to their possessions, beyond 
such chances as must be guarded against in all coun- 
tries. 

ELECTIONS. 

The frequency of elections is remarked upon as 
evil, but I know of no bad result. It is, in one 
respect, even useful. The young men who are con- 
stantly coming upon the stage, would hardly under- 
stand the nature of our institutions if it were not for 
the constant and earnest discussions that arise from 
this cause. It is true that we make a deal of noise 
about them, but the noise does no harm. I remember, 
when very young, to have heard it proposed to have 
fairs here, as they do in England. But it was objected 
that it was dangerous to bring our people together in 
great numbers, where there is so little control. Now, 



47 



on one occasion, during the preparation for the great 
contest for the presidency between General Harrison 
and Mr. Van Buren, in 1840, it was computed that 
one hundred thousand strangers of both parties entered 
the city of Boston in a day. There was no violence. 
They separated quietly at evening. There had been 
no military force to control them ; and there were, I 
think, fewer than ten individuals who gave occasion 
for any interference from the police. 

Such vast meetings for political purposes have 
become common in the country, and give practical 
contradiction to those predictions of danger to the 
community from disorder and violence, that are so 
frequently made. 

It is said, that our elections are merely contests of 
" the ins and the outs," for office ; and many of our 
own people will tell you the same ; but it is not so. 
Deep and important principles lie at the bottom of 
our political divisions. For more than twenty years, 
it was a question, hotly disputed, whether the revolu- 
tion in France and the career of Napoleon deserved 
our sympathy and support ; or whether they were due 
to Great Britain, in spite of aggressions upon us. 
This question terminated in foreign war. Again, it 
has long been a dispute of deep interest, whether our 
national government has a right to protect domestic 
manufactures by duties. This question brought us, 
ten years ago, as was supposed, to the verge of civil 
war. I never believed in the danger of this ; but 
the mere supposition shows that we dispute about 
something more important than the mere possession of 
offiice. Should the right of suffrage be extended 



equally to all, even to the emigrant but lately settled 
among us ; or should men of property have additional 
influence in voting? Should the powers of the gen- 
eral government be construed with strict jealousy ; or 
should it be allowed powers incidentally necessary 
to its action, such as that to create a bank, and to 
make internal improvements ? These, and other 
questions of equal magnitude, have divided us ; and 
the people, in the main, are actuated by an honest 
belief, in adopting the sides they take, however true it 
may be that candidates for office often consult merely 
their own chance of success, in siding with one party 
or the other. There was one period when all existing 
questions were nearly laid to rest, and we really had 
httle to dispute about but office. As a proof how little 
the people at large are disposed to engage in quarrels 
for that alone, it should be remembered that President 
Monroe, representing a party that had been vehe- 
mently opposed for twenty years, received, on his re- 
election at that period, the votes of all the electors in 
the Union but one. 

POPULAR VIOLENCE, MOBS, &c. 

There is one principle of security in our institutions, 
that operates with surprising effect. It lies in the 
division of property. It seems at times as if riot and 
disorder might extend to any degree of mischief; but 
as soon as it becomes apparent that a man is not safe 
with his family in his own house, the mob itself 
becomes conservative ; for almost every man has his 
household, however small. A striking instance of this 



49 



occurred about ten years since in Providence, the 
chief town in Rhode Island. A quarrel had arisen 
between the seamen and the blacks, in which so many 
people took part, that, finally, it spread into an alarm- 
ing riot, and the whole place was in confusion and 
danger. When it came to that, the militia, citizens of 
the place, were ordered out. Proclamation was made 
by the Governor in due form of law, to the rioters to 
disperse ; and on their refusal, they were fired upon, 
and a number of them killed and wounded. They 
fled instantly. Order was restored at once, and main- 
tained, from that moment, with ease. The first essay 
of Napoleon with a mob, in his youth, was not more 
effective. The submission was probably more com- 
plete than if the execution had been by soldiers of a 
standing army ; for the rioters were conscious that 
nothing but their own guilt, and imperious necessity, 
could bring their fellow-citizens upon them as a mili- 
tary force. 

A similar occurrence took place at Baltimore. 
Owing to the imbecihty of the city authorities, the riot 
continued for several days, and there was considerable 
destruction of property. The mayor resigned. One 
of his predecessors, an old man of experience and 
decision, was put in his place. He took the measures 
prescribed by the laws, brought out the military, and 
restored order forthwith ; though with serious blood- 
shed. 

Wherever the use of this safeguard has been 

resorted to it has operated with equal force, and has 

proved that, in such cases, power is so clearly on the 

side of order, that it is only necessary to show the 

7 



^0 



intention of using it, to produce the desired efTect. 
Some years ago, owing to the prejudices existing 
against CathoUcs, and a behef in stories about the 
crimes of monks, and so on, a violent animosity had 
been excited at the erection of a convent near here ; 
and, one night, the convent was suddenly burned to 
the ground. It was thought that the municipal author- 
ities of the town in which this happened had not acted 
with vigor. It was found difficult to convict any one 
of the crime. Most of the guilty escaped unpunished. 
The cry of Popery and the Inquisition, with stories of 
dungeons and torture, became popular ; the ignorant 
with their instigators became more daring ; and, on the 
anniversary of the burning, preparations were made to 
enter Boston in great numbers, with a grand proces- 
sion, apparently in honor of freedom of rehgion, but, 
probably, with designs of violence against peaceable 
Catholics, residing here. Our mayor was a man 
suited to the occasion, and knew what was coming. 
The procession was met upon the bridge over which 
they were approaching, by a deputation of peace 
officers, with the information, that if they crossed it, a 
large body of men, prepared to assemble at the tolling 
of a bell, would be under arms to receive them. 
After a short consultation, they retired as they had 
advanced, and quietly dispersed. 

Probably, any one who will examine the subject 
without prejudice, will be convinced that the principle 
of security, not only against disorder and violence, 
(under the naitie of Lynch law, of which 1 have 
already spoken, or in any other shape,) — but also 
against serious misrule, is inherent in our institutions ; 



61 



firmly founded upon the personal interest which so 
large a portion of the community have in its preserva- 
tion. After General Jackson, who was a great favor- 
ite with the most numerous class as the representative 
of the ultra democracy of the country, had been in 
power eight years ; and his successor, acting on the 
same policy, had been in for about three years ; the 
people became convinced that the measures which 
they had pursued were not the best for the country. 
Whether they were right or wrong, in the behef that a 
change was necessary, is not important. The people 
believed that it was necessary for the welfare of the 
country, and they made it, peaceably, but thoroughly, 
by an overwhelming majority. It is only necessary to 
touch this principle, selfish if you please, by convinc- 
ing them of general danger, to obtain a speedy 
remedy. 

M. De Tocqueville, in his work on the United 
States, tells us that it is a mistake to suppose that the 
democracy of this age has arisen merely from an acci- 
dental dispute between Great Britain and some of her 
colonies. He says that it is the result of a struggle 
between two great principles of humanity, which has 
been going on for five or six centuries. If this be 
true, certainly the victors in the struggle, now that 
their turn has come, may claim the merit of acting 
with moderation in their success ; even if they do err 
in some matters of taste. When the most is made of 
the evils of popular violence, which are promptly 
reported in their worst shape to the world, they are 
not great, in comparison with the known oppressions 
and villanies of the Front-de-Boeufs of petty tyranny ; 



62 



even without adding what may be behaved of tales of 
injustice and horror that can never be fully known, 
until that great day of retribution when the secrets of 
arbitrary power shall be laid o|3en. It is computed 
that the deaths by violence even in the French revolu- 
tion, not classed under the head of civil war (as the 
war in La Vendee), were less than those in the mas- 
sacre of the Huguenots, caused by the court party on 
the eve of St. Bartholomew in the reign of Charles 
the Ninth. It is true, that difference in religious belief 
led to the cruel destruction in this case ; but the 
arrangements for such a bloody surprise could never 
have been perfected, without that concentration of 
power against which the civilized world has been 
struggling for ages. 

Supposing the computation to be incorrect, as it 
may be, still, if it be only an approximation to the 
truth, even if the deaths by the guillotine were double 
those of the Huguenots, it is a strong case on the side 
of popular action, considering that the barriers of 
centuries were suddenly broken away. A few inci- 
dents from history would make fearful additions to the 
amount of deliberate destruction on the other side. 

STRENGTH OF THE GOVERNMENT. 

It has been asserted by Captain Marryat and others, 
that our national government has not the strength to 
enforce the execution of its own laws ; and, as proof 
of this, a dispute which arose, under the name of 
" Nullification," about ten years since, is triumphantly 
referred to. In one of the Southern States, the right 



63 



of the government to impose so high duties as had 
been laid on imported goods was denied, and the 
leading men threatened that they should not be col- 
lected there. No actual violence ever took place ; 
but a law was passed by the general government pro- 
viding for a gradual annual reduction of these duties. 
This law, commonly called the compromise act, is 
frequently spoken of by travellers as a concession 
from the national government of all that had been 
demanded by the discontented state, which was said to 
have " bearded" it. It was not so considered here ; 
but rather as a loop-hole by which the malecontents 
were suffered to withdraw from the contest and avoid 
the appearance of defeat. However this may be, 
when the term contemplated, by this act for gradual 
reduction, approached so near its limit that the reduc- 
tion of duties was found to be inconvenient, the old 
duties, or nearly the same, were imposed anew. It is 
insisted at the South that the new law, or tariff, is, in 
principle, precisely the same, and quite as objectiona- 
ble to them as the old one. Yet it has been enforced, 
from the day of its passage, eighteen months since, as 
thoroughly and quietly, throughout the Union, as any 
law could be under the most despotic government in 
Europe. And this has taken place under the admin- 
istration of a mere vice-president — (the president 
having died within his term), of a man personally 
unpopular and by no means remarkable for energy of 
character. 



64 



GENERAL RESULTS OF OUR EXPERIMENT. 

Certainly, it must be admitted that our system of 
government is, thus far, successful in the main. If 
we have committed some mistakes, as other people 
do who try new inventions, it is rather a hasty con- 
clusion that our total failure must be the consequence, 
rather than that the correction of errors, and wiser 
conduct in future, are to be the result of our experi- 
ence. 

We have learned, during the last ten years, that one 
state cannot confer the powers necessary for a national 
bank ; and we shall not try that again. 

We have learned that rail-roads and canals may 
possibly prove unproductive ; and that states which 
guaranty their success must be prepared to make up 
any deficiency in the tolls, by laying taxes for the 
deficit. 

We have learned that when states have parted with 
one of the prerogatives of sovereignty (the right to 
impose duties on imports), they must be careful in the 
exercise of another, that of borrowing money. 

We have the satisfaction, too, in our experience 
under this head, of having found the chief opposition 
to such borrowing to come from the most democratic 
party in the country. I say the satisfaction ; for, 
although I am opposed to their party, it is a satisfac- 
tion to reflect that they, who might be supposed to be 
the most needy and most likely to profit by borrowing 
money abroad should have been unfavorably disposed 
to that mode of obtaining it; as, according to my 



56 



observation, they were to a remarkable degree. It is 
satisfactory to believe, too, as I do, that, whatever we 
may think of the demagogues who lead or mislead 
them at times, the intentions of the mass are right ; 
that, in order to induce them to do wrong, it is neces- 
sary to deceive a large portion of them ; and that, 
when they are convinced that they are doing injustice, 
they can be induced to change their course. The 
greatest mistake in relation to them has arisen from 
want of confidence in their intelligence and sense of 
right, which are found to be worthy of reliance, when 
once they are fairly addressed. And, in this business of 
provision for state debts, those politicians who show 
the greatest courage to impose taxes and act honestly 
towards the creditor, will probably be found eventually 
to be most in favor with the people. 

We have learned from late disasters, that steady 
industry, in regular occupations, is more likely to 
secure the means of living comfortably, than dashing 
attempts at sudden fortune are likely to secure any- 
thing at all. As proof of this, we see, that, though 
money has been more abundant, for a year, in a large 
portion of the country, than it ever was before, and 
property low, there is none of the readiness to engage 
in hazardous speculations for which we have been 
remarkable heretofore, under similar circumstances. 
There is reason to beheve that we may become a 
more quiet people ; and that the restless desire for a 
change of lot in life, which was natural enough when 
a new system offered such facilities and temptations 
for it, has received a check. The lessons that we 
have received have been useful ; and there is ground 



66 



for encouragement rather than despondency in the 
present aspect of the country. 

^ GROWING ATTACHMENT TO THE UNION. 

Those who can remember how we stood in the 
early part of this century, and all that was then said 
of us, probably think, as I believe, that we have a 
much better prospect of tranquilly passing its close, 
than we were supposed to have, when it began, of 
ever reaching the middle of it, with our present 
government. After all the noise that you hear, the 
union among our states was never so strong, since its 
formation, as it is at this day. Many people among 
us, who go but little from home, would stare at such 
an assertion ; but those who traverse the states from 
one extremity to the other, know well that what I tell 
you is true. 

The numbers who would be ready, if the Union 
were really in danger, to step forward and maintain 
it, increase every year. A feeling of fraternal alliance, 
throughout, is becoming common. This was once 
happily expressed by a southern acquaintance whom I 
met, unexpectedly, in one of the streets in Boston, 
taking a view of the town. He was a man of distinc- 
tion in his own state ; and, for the first time, found 
himself nearly a thousand miles from home. " I am 
not merely surprised," he said, " at what I see ; 1 am 
even more delighted at the thought that this is not a 
foreign place, but, still my home / " — I am sure that 
when I first crossed the Alleghany Mountains to the 
South-west, many years since, in the winter, by what 



57 



was then called the wilderness-route to Kentucky, and, 
after fording rivers, with rough fare under log-cabins 
in the deep woods, for a week or two, emerged upon 
a city in the vast plain beyond, where were equipages 
that might have rivalled many in New York, I felt the 
surprise of my Southern friend, at the extent and 
resources of my own country, and equal pleasure, 
with him, that it was all one. 

The increase of communication, too, by rail-roads 
and canals, is strengthening the interest of distant 
states in each other. It is a fact, of some importance 
in reference to disputes like that of Nullification, that 
some of our states most widely separated are even 
more concerned to keep together, than others that are 
contiguous. Personal observation in the two states, 
that, within the last ten or fifteen years, have spoken 
most slightingly of the Union, leads me to believe that 
they have, all the time, had more real regard for the 
rest of the states, than they had for each other, though 
a single river, the Savannah, divides them. If they 
could have agreed on the first step necessary for sepa- 
ration from the Union, they would have been sure to 
quarrel at the second, on the question which should 
stand first in a new confederation. Their movements, 
in any way, would not be of vital importance, unless 
they could induce states further south to unite with 
them ; and, in that case, another party, more potent 
than all of them, would be heard. Away, far at the 
West and North, are free states, growing yearly like 
young lions, who look to the " Father of rivers" for 
access to the sea. If it were necessary, they would 
join, with overwhelming power, in asserting that the 



58 



mouth of the Mississippi is property in which we all 
have a share ; and that those who have settled around 
it cannot be suffered to make a foreign nation of 
themselves, and compel the rest of us to run the gant- 
let among them, in passing to and fro. 

It may be, as the foes of all attempts at self-govern- 
ment seem ardently to hope, that our dissolution is to 
come from slavery, the most dangerous of those 
" ulcers" upon our body politic that Mr. Dickens talks 
of. This is a disease, however, which our mother 
gave us ; and if she adds an occasional malediction, it 
is perhaps not surprising. 1 have explained to you, 
that it is impossible for us to rid ourselves of the evil 
by the same means that she has used in her own case ; 
and even if it should prove fatal to us, it would by no 
means follow, that some future republic, of purer birth, 
may not permanently enjoy the good that we have 
shown to be possible by fifty years of actual trial. 

If you have read much of this and derived satisfac- 
tion from it, I have only to ask, in return, that you 
will do what Jittle may be in your power to make our 
case understood, even by the Americans whom you 
see ; some of whom do not go prepared for all the 
accusations which they may have to meet. 

Under all changes of government or fortune, 
I remain, always. 

Very truly yours, 

T. G. GARY. 



[NOTE, p. 39.] 

Some readers may not be aware that in suffering the national 
government to act directly upon each individual, instead of trans- 
mitting its authority through the governments of the different 
states, who might regard it or not, we have introduced a new 
principle, which is the distinguishing mark of our form of republic, 
and which operates with surprising effect. 

We had united, for the war of the revolution by which our inde- 
pendence was established, under the well-known form of a confede- 
racy of states ; on the principle that each state should contribute, 
in its due proportion, towards the maintenance of a general govern- 
ment. The pressure of external danger kept us together ; but 
when that was removed we began to suffer from defects inherent 
in the system. Some of the states were slow to comply with the 
requisitions made upon them. The wants of the general govern- 
ment were poorly supplied, and it could never guaranty the faithful 
observance of treaties made with foreign powers, since infractions 
could not be punished without the aid of state governments that 
might rather choose to countenance them. To use compulsion, if 
a large state should resist, would be civil war, which would never 
do ; whereas resistance to the power of all the states united, by 
any one citizen, would have been idle. 

We staggered on, imbecile, uncertain, and poor, until the people 
of the states were ready to unite and form an efficient national 
head, whose action, for the purposes for which it was created, 
should be independent of the state governments. This was done ; 
and their constitution begins — "We, the people of the United 
States, in order to form a more perfect government — do establish 
this constitution," &c. 



60 



A celebrated Southern orator, who opposed its adoption, ex- 
claimed that "On those three little words — we the People — 
instead of — we the States" — hung changes that, in his view, 
were vast and fearful. Changes followed ; vast, as he said, but 
salutary. The new government was organized in the year 1789, 
and Washington was the first president. At that period our pros- 
perity may be said to have commenced. 

Those who are desirous of obtaining more full information on 
the subject, without attempting any laborious investigation, will 
find it in a book, of moderate compass, entitled " The Federalist." 
It was written, in short numbers, by Madison, Hamilton, and Jay, 
for the purpose of explaining to the people of the Union the pecu- 
liar characteristics of the form of government offered for their 
adoption. The explanations are so clear, that a few of the num- 
bers, selected by their titles, will serve to indicate certain distinc- 
tions in the structure of various forms of government which every 
one will find it convenient to understand. 




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